Caffeine

9/1/24

I told myself I’ll quit caffeine, and for the first time in my life, I got a decaf and called it growth. Then I backtracked.

I walked to the Old Brooklyn Bagel Shoppe, considered getting a coffee, but only got a bagel. I tried eating it in the sun until two bees assaulted it and I had to run away. On foot, I realized that the bagel didn’t make sense without coffee.

Mille Feuille, a bakery specializing in macaroons, was across the street. Did it make sense to buy only coffee from a bakery specializing in macaroons? No. I got a medium americano and sat outside when a bigger bee arrived and chased me down the street.

Lulu Miller, my boss, wrote a book called 'Why Fish Don’t Exist' about David Starr Jordan. Jordan, she wrote, “eschew[ed] not just booze and tobacco but even caffeine, for its dangerous ability to alter perception.” Lulu’s big on caffeine.

I read that line in college, on a train, when I was addicted to caffeine. The line appealed to me because by that point I had also eschewed booze and was never a smoker, so all that was left to eschew was caffeine. Every day, for four dollars, I’d buy two hours of a personality and faster mental processing, followed by four hours of mild anxiety and rotting.

Here’s the thing. Coffee is good for problem solving, convergent thinking, but for divergent thinking - think mind expansion, creative work - coffee may not work.

There is some evidence that creativity is best in lower attentional levels, lower prefrontal cortex activity, and thus more mind wandering. Creative idea generation involves enhanced cognitive control with spontaneous thought. Caffeine limits spontaneous thought. A 2020 study that tested coffee's effect on creativity found that a 12-ounce cup of coffee led to significantly higher problem-solving abilities but didn’t affect creative idea generation. Which made me wonder whether creative people throughout history were heavy caffeine consumers. If coffee isn’t good for creativity, it's reasonable to assume they weren’t.

There’s a book called Daily Rituals by Mason Currey which has short profiles on the daily routines of 161 artists from Beethoven to Einstein to Jane Austen. This article summarized six patterns that emerged - be a morning person, don’t give up the day job, take tons of walks, stick to one schedule, consume caffeine (!), and learn to work anywhere.

I’m a big fan of Manto’s work. He died of alcoholism - there’s actually a whole paper that uses Manto to examine the link between creativity and mental illness. I can’t find anything about him drinking coffee off of a google search. Christopher Nolan apparently had to give up caffeine after experiencing insomnia, but I couldn’t find anything about whether he used it while writing. Katherine Boo and Varun Grover are other favorite writers of mine - I’d like to know how/if they use coffee. Also which artists in history worked sober.

Caffeine is a plant alkaloid, which we should define.

Matter is anything that takes up space and can be weighted. The basic building block of matter is an atom. Combine a bunch of atoms of the same type, and you get an element. Put together two or more elements and you get a compound. If your compound contains at least one nitrogen atom, bam, you get an alkaloid. And we know what plants are (or do we? I don't know. Picture a green thing). Thus a plant alkaloid is an alkaloid that comes from plants. Great.

Coffee blocks adenosine receptors. Adenosine regulates sleep. In the heart, caffeine increases coronary blood flow. In the lungs, it can cause muscle relaxation and bronchial dilatation, which is the widening of the airways. I didn't know coffee was antiasthmatic, which means it can be used to help treat asthma. It isn’t a replacement for asthma medication, but the increased airflow can help with shortness of breath. In the brain, it reduces the strength of brainwaves linked with calmness.

Here’s the kicker - the book on caffeine throws away this sentence: “Caffeine does not have a convincing profile as an addictive drug.” Which made no sense to me at first. How can it not be addictive when I “needed” coffee every day in college?

First things first, I’m not sure what the profile of an addictive drug is, but this claim makes sense because think about it. Have you ever desperately itched for caffeine? Or felt completely powerless without it? I have not. Secondly, if you drink coffee continuously for three days, you build a tolerance. A 2012 study found that after three days of caffeine ingestion, the number of adenosine receptors in the brain significantly increased. This means that after three days, you’re gonna need more coffee to be as alert and will experience worse withdrawal. That’s the “addiction.”

Withdrawal symptoms include headaches, irritability, nervousness, and a reduction in energy. That's the "rotting." I've also experienced cramps, dehydration, and bad sleep.

The good news is that adenosine receptor levels typically reverse after a 7-day break. This means that to truly optimize your caffeine intake, you just have to strategically moderate it. Take a 7+ day break (or reduce intake) to allow for your adenosine receptors to reset. You'll get the same energy and memory boost when you restart the cycle.

I finished my bagel and coffee in Prospect Park, and got up fully knowing my right leg was asleep. Instead of going home, I walked to Unnameable Books and impulsively bought a book that required buying. Nine dollars. I checked out and then saw a beautiful cookbook called ‘Fresh India.’ Fifteen dollars. Checked out again. Apparently coffee also makes me spend money.

A lot of people in the world - creative or not - drink coffee. It has benefits - potentially reducing the likelihood of cancer, diabetes, Parkinson’s, depression. Caffeine releases dopamine (reward and pleasure), norepinephrine (alertness), serotonin (mood regulation), acetylcholine (memory and learning), glutamate (excitement), and GABA (calmness). I wrote this article (or blog... whatever) caffeinated. It can also make you smarter - drinking caffeine after a learning task boosted memory recall up to 24 hours later.

And looks like I don’t need to quit. I just need to keep resetting my adenosine receptors. Finding a balance is harder than quitting anything in life. I'll just take a break, get a decaf, call it growth, and backtrack again. And again. And again. And again.